Joe Henrich’s book on the WEIRDest people in the world is ambitious and packed with ideas and data. To be honest it isn’t my sort of thing but you have to admire what he has done. He is looking at the psychology of weird versus non-weird people. Weird being western, educated, industrialized, rich & democratic….
Category: Culture
Comparing Canadian And US Consumers
Comparing consumers in different countries can be challenging. I must confess to having doubts about a lot of cross-cultural research, see here for lots of grouchy comments on cross cultural measurement. I worry it is what nice middle class people do when they want to stereotype while still seeing themselves as free of prejudice. Suffice…
What Is Antisocial Punishment?
Why do people punish others when it costs them to do so? This is one of the most important questions in social life. We tend to do the right thing when we are confident that we can’t cheat without being punished by bystanders. This helps hold society together. People who punish despite there being no…
Does WEIRDness matter?
There is a debate in psychology and consumer behaviour. This concerns the generalizability of results from western university laboratory experiments. Lab experiments can be great at isolating causes. Yet, what you discover may not apply outside the specific context. Experiments, a criticism goes, tend to use a specific pool of subjects, so called WEIRD subjects….
US Individualism And A US Collective Identity
When I first moved to the US I couldn’t get over the flags. (It was summer of 2002 and flags were at their apex.) There were all sorts of flags, small flags, big flags, really big flags and blocks out the sun size. This very visible adherence to the country, the collective group, was startling….
Storytelling: Not An Insult. But You Need Cogent Stories
Critics often label evolutionary psychology “just so stories”– fanciful storytelling. This has become a popular criticism. “Just so stories” is a fantastic phrase. It is so evocative and damning. Serious scholars even use it to justify not reading evolutionary psychology. The critics sometimes have a point. I agree that some research relies on dubious arguments….
Big Questions
One of my favorite popular science books is Jared Diamond’s Guns, Germs and Steel. Some didn’t appreciate it as much yet it does a fantastic job of asking big questions. These are the questions most worth asking. The Importance Of Geography Guns, Germs, and Steel is packed with fascinating details, has a great tempo, and…
The Politician’s Fallacy
Yes Minister, a British TV show, explained a logical mistake called The Politician’s Fallacy. The politician sees a problem and feels that “Something must be done”, They find an approach and say “This is something”, Then they make a logical leap, “this must be done”. Measuring National Culture Numerical analysis of culture in business reminds…
